Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror

IntellectualConservative.com ^ | January 13, 2004 | Rachel Alexander

[az4vlad]

A senior U.S. intelligence official has written a book under the pseudonym “Anonymous” highly critical of the U.S. war on terror. It should be noted that it is no mystery who “Anonymous” is, Michael Scheuer, a senior official in the CIA who resigned in November during the Bush administration’s shake-up of that department. (1) Scheuer ran the Counterterrorist Center’s bin Laden station in the late 1990’s and authored another anonymous book entitled Through Our Enemies’ Eyes: Osama bin Laden, Radical Islam, and the Future of America two years ago. It is not clear whether it was CIA regulation or because of Scheuer’s own reasons that these books were published anonymously. (2)

The theme of Imperial Hubris is “Blame America.” Scheuer attacks reactive U.S. policy in Afghanistan, and instead of placing responsibility for terrorism on bin Laden and the terrorists or on the excesses of Islam, Scheuer instead claims that it is U.S. overseas policies that have caused the terrorist attacks. The problem with this reasoning can be seen in the analogy of placing the blame upon a rape victim for dressing provocatively, instead of the rapist who chose to rape her. Scheuer writes in a strident tone, reminiscent of Michael Moore, using repetition to hammer his main point across – which is that top U.S. officials ignored the lessons of Afghanistan history when they decided to instill a secular democratic government in Afghanistan. Although Scheuer offers ample reasons why he believes a secular democratic government cannot work in Afghanistan, he omits including any proof of the other half of his thesis - that senior officials failed to review the lessons of history, known within the CIA as the “checkables.” This is a serious flaw in his book. It is simply not plausible that senior-level officials, particularly top advisors within the Bush administration with extensive and impressive backgrounds in foreign policy, would be ignorant of recent events in Afghanistan. It is a stretch to assert that they had no knowledge of the former Soviet Union’s inability to capture the regime in the 1980’s and 1990’s. What is ironic – and noted briefly by Scheuer himself - is that it was U.S. aid to the Taliban that defeated the Soviets.

Since the entire book is based upon this arguably false premise, unless you agree with it, the rest of the book falls apart. Any history or political science major knows the history of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan - and anyone who has seen Rambo III knows the Soviet Union lost in Afghanistan. Scheuer is essentially an isolationist and if anything, is himself ignorant of history. He wants you to believe that a non-democratic country cannot change into a democracy, at least not with any outside aid. This theory conveniently ignores the history of most democratic countries today – the U.S. itself was at one time a collection of matriarchal and tribal Indian governments, which became a republican democracy through the influx of European and other immigrants as well as a few wars.

Scheuer’s arguments are nothing more than philosophical differences. Scheuer disagrees with the widely accepted conclusion reached by Francis Fukuyama in The End of History and the Last Man, which postulated that the world had finally reached a consensus that liberal democracy had proven to be the most viable political institution in man’s ideological evolution. (3) Scheuer mocks this belief as “imperial hubris;” a “way of thinking American elites have acquired since the end of World War II.” (p. 165) Instead, he glumly predicts that no more countries will become democracies, “…most of the world outside North America is not, does not want to be, and probably will never be just like us.” (p. 167) His is a philosophy of “uniformitarianism;” that nations and institutions forever remain the same.

Scheuer fails to offer any credible evidence to support his second main point that terrorists hate the U.S. because of its policies, not its democratic society. It is not disputed that the terrorists resent U.S. support to Israel and countries such as India that are hostile to fundamentalist Islam. However, if the U.S. took a more isolationist path and halted its aid and arms assistance to these countries, the terrorists would continue to deeply resent the U.S. The U.S. is one of the wealthiest nations in the world and home to Hollywood where women run around scantily clothed. If Scheuer really thinks the terrorists are not bothered by the excesses of democracy in the U.S. as flaunted by our unofficial royalty of Britney Spears and Madonna, he is either naïve or has a political agenda. Under the ideal fundamentalist Muslim regime with its sharia law, epitomized by Afghanistan under the Taliban, women who behaved and dressed as Britney Spears and Madonna would have been beheaded. Scheuer himself even points out that bin Laden preferred to watch old Westerns over other types of Hollywood movies, because the women were usually fully covered. Scheuer claims that fundamentalist Islam has no problem living “side-by-side in peace with monotheists, polytheists, communists, democrats, snake-charmers, and even National League baseball fans.” (p. 9) This is a pipedream. The fundamentalist hard-line Muslims who Scheuer believes are the only ones capable of ruling Islamic countries insist that non-Muslims must either convert to Islam, obey Islam, or be executed. (4)

The book does contain a few insights that cannot be dismissed, however, such as the fact that over 95% of all Saudis between ages 25-41 polled in 2002 expressed sympathy with Osama bin Laden. (p. 72) This is a serious concern and supports Scheuer’s proposition that it is not only the terrorists that hate the U.S., but many so-called “moderate” Muslims as well. And to his credit, Scheuer does not fall into the easily predictable left-wing positions that so many Democratic attack dogs defend. Scheuer is quite critical of multilateralism, criticizing the U.S. for deliberating with its allies first instead of attacking al Qaeda in Afghanistan immediately after 9-11.

Ultimately, Imperial Hubris suffers from its extremist rhetoric. It is difficult to continue reading it with statements sprinkled throughout like the following: “…evangelical Christians have a fervor for God and his word similar to the Islamists’, though the former have yet to take up arms in his defense.” (p. 2) This is a bizarre comparison, considering evangelical Christians (and note Scheuer does not even say fundamentalist Christians) are composed of law-abiding Christians such as the Reverend Billy Graham and Dr. James Dobson, who have never taken up weapons in the name of God nor does the Bible instruct them to (religious crusades supposedly taken in the name of God in the past were certainly not done by “evangelical Christians”).

Scheuer claims that the U.S. is losing the war on terror, declaring that we have seen “no tangible evidence of victory” on p. 170, yet on pp. 87-91 he lists 30 victories against al Qaeda by the U.S. and its allies after 9-11, which he describes as “impressive.”

If anything, Imperial Hubris is an interesting read if only to hear what fashionable arguments today’s opponents of the Bush administration’s war on terror are relying upon. If you can tolerate the strident repetition of its core premises and finish the book, you will breathe a sigh of relief, having discovered that the arguments are flawed and lacking in support, reinforcing confidence that the Bush administration is on the right track in the war on terror as well as in establishing democracy in Afghanistan.

1. http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/nov2004/rice-n17.shtml

2. http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/other_stories/multipage/documents/03949394.asp

3. http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/us/fukuyama.htm

4. http://www.freedomhouse.org/religion/country/afghanistan/Sharia%20in%20Kabul.htm

Rachel Alexander is co-editor of IntellectualConservative.com and an attorney practicing law in Phoenix, Arizona.

[FierceKulak]

Just an example of someone with more education than common sense.

[kjam22]

The book does contain a few insights that cannot be dismissed, however, such as the fact that over 95% of all Saudis between ages 25-41 polled in 2002 expressed sympathy with Osama bin Laden. (p. 72) This is a serious concern and supports Scheuer’s proposition that it is not only the terrorists that hate the U.S., but many so-called “moderate” Muslims as well.

That's a fundamental problem in this thing. We're fighting a war designed to "change their minds"....

[MEG33]

Bloggers & Personal


For all of you who have blogs or personal web sites or personal news or opinion or forum sites that you would like to discuss or promote on Free Republic, here's the place to do it.

Our new Bloggers & Personal forum is for:

Posting from your blog.

Posting from other peoples blogs.

Posting your from your personal web site.



Posting from other peoples personal web sites.

Promoting your blog.

Promoting other peoples blogs.

Promoting your personal web site.

Promoting your favorite web sites.

Posting from your favorite outside forums.



Posting from your favorite lefty forums or sites (DUh and the like).

Click on the "Bloggers & Personal" forum link on the Forums sidebar of the latest posts pages.

---

[Publius6961]

Why does posting an article almost a year old not only raise my BS antennas, but also pegs my terrorism meter?

What, I can't help asking, is the purpose of posting this article, again?

[MEG33]

He only posts his blog..

[Max Combined]

"such as the fact that over 95% of all Saudis between ages 25-41 polled in 2002 expressed sympathy with Osama bin Laden."

So we should not feel bad about turning Mecca and Medina into radioactive black glass.

[Max Combined]

"Scheuer ran the Counterterrorist Center’s bin Laden station in the late 1990’s"

That this fool had thing important position shows us just how bad the CIA has become.

[Max Combined]

"Scheuer is quite critical of multilateralism, criticizing the U.S. for deliberating with its allies first instead of attacking al Qaeda in Afghanistan immediately after 9-11."

For all practical purposes, we did attack al Qaeda in Afghanistan immediately after 9-11. No harm, no foul.

This clown just wanted to sell books, so he pandered to the book buying, anti-American liberal public.

[superiorslots]

Here in the midwest most people I run across are not really concerned about the war on terror or terrosits acts because so far nothing has affected them personally. That is why we MAY lose the wot. The american peoples hearts are not into it.

If a major city gets nuked though it will be a different story...or if their tv or internet get shuts down by a terrorist act watch out for repercussions though.

[Alberta's Child]

The West is "losing the war on terror" for the simple reason that we feel a pathological need to declare wars on idiotic, nebulous things like "terror," "poverty," "drugs, "illiteracy," etc. instead of identifying actual enemies. Terrorism is a method, not an enemy -- and we will always "lose" wars against methods.

[Alberta's Child]

Here in New York most people are not concerned about terrorist acts, either. In fact, I've said before that the "war on terror" was officially over (and lost) back in 2002 when the New York City Council decided that cigarette smoke was the most pressing issue the city faced.

[iconoclast]

Other reviews:

Here

And here

[CyberAnt]

No wonder Goss wanted this guy gone .. another of the "blame America" crowd .. supposedly SERVING in our govt. Good grief!

[iconoclast]

No wonder Goss wanted this guy gone .. another of the "blame America" crowd .. supposedly SERVING in our govt. Good grief!

Reading the book are you?

When you finish, pick up a copy of Robert Baer's See No Evil. Its another good one.

The following is from the preface to Imperial Hubris:

Using unclassified material, I intend in this book to show there is not now, and never has been, a shortage of knowledge about the nature and immediacy of the bin Laden threat, but only a lack of courage to tell the truth about it fully, openly, and with disregard for career-related consequences of truth telling.
And later, he says "The failure of many to perform their duty lies at the heart of why three thousand Americans perished on 11 September, 2001,"

Does that sound subversive to you?

Scheuer was a mid-level analyst. He tells a tale of a massive screw up by the HIGHER UPS that went on for years.

If Goss did indeed can him, it fits perfectly the administration's policy of letting no good deed go unpunished.

[CyberAnt]

"instead of placing responsibility for terrorism on bin Laden and the terrorists or on the excesses of Islam, Scheuer instead claims that it is U.S. overseas policies that have caused the terrorist attacks"

Anybody so ignorant that they blame America for terrorist attacks .. is not somebody I want involved in forming any kind of policy involving the USA.

No, I'm not reading the book. I believe WE ARE WINNING THE WAR ON TERROR - and I BELIEVE WE WILL CONTINUE TO WIN IT - despite the stupid books by people like Scheuer who have an axe to grind .. evidently people wouldn't listen to him bash the USA as the bad guy - and that's why I believe he was encouraged to leave.

YOU CAN'T WIN A WAR WITH PEOPLE WHO DON'T BELIEVE THE WAR CAN BE WON - OR WITH PEOPLE WHO DON'T EVEN KNOW WHO THE HELL THE ENEMY IS - and America is not the enemy of the world.